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Tag Archives: Silhouette

So there are a few things I like a lot – and Harry Potter and pubs are two of them! I was participating in a craft exchange a few months back and one of the crafts I had in mind was a painted wooden sign that I’d make using vinyl cut with my Silhouette as a reverse stencil. It sounded like a good idea, but I’d never actually used that technique before, so I figured I should create something for myself first, just to prove that I could make something that way.

I picked up this naked ornate-looking wood sign at Michael’s and a few bottles of acrylic craft paint. I thought it would make the perfect pub sign. Since my husband and I are big Harry Potter fans, I thought it’d be fun to do a Potter-themed pub sign. I downloaded a Gryffindor lion design from the Silhouette store (which is no longer there, otherwise I’d link to it…), and asked the girls from my craft group for some ideas on Potter sounding pub names. Someone suggested “The House Cup” and I thought it was perfect! I used a Harry Potter font (probably Wizard school) for the pub name, and cut everything out using indoor vinyl on my Sil.

A few coats of paint and some peeling later, and I had an awesome new Harry Potter-esque pub sign:

Isn’t it just, like, the greatest thing ever?! I hung it in our dining room, across from the wine cabinet and wine glass shelves that we use as a bar area. It fits right in with our other beer and liquor related art and it makes me smile every time I see it in the room!

I have a confession to make: I totally did not do anything for Max’s teachers in 2013. Or 2012. I didn’t know it was a thing in 2012 – and I was a little busy trying to navigate new mommyhood and returning to work and breastfeeding and pumping and staring at/smelling my baby. I DID know that it was Teacher Appreciation Week last year, but Max was transitioning to a new room and I totally just flaked. So this year I felt like I had some making up to do – which meant that baked goods or Dunkin’ gift cards seemed like not quite enough. BUT since I wanted to make sure to do something for the teachers in his infant room from last year, I knew that I couldn’t spend too much.

Inspiration struck me at Target (as it so often does)! I was cruising through the dollar spot when I found reusable plastic tumblers in one of the $3 bins. PERFECT! I’d seen pins using those tumblers and giving one with a bag of tea and writing something cutesy like, “You’re a TEA-riffic teacher!” on a gift tag. I knew that I had some permanent vinyl in my stash at home that would coordinate with the Spring-y color palette of the tumblers and I figured I’d monogram them and throw some drink mix packets inside. Easy, right?

And actually, for once, it was that easy! I found a monogram design that was super adorable: a scalloped edge circle with a letter in the middle. The super smart thing that made me go for that design out of the many I saw in the Silhouette design store was that the letter in the middle was a stencil – so I wouldn’t have to deal with small insides of letters to make a letter A, for instance, make sense. I cut the designs out of permanent vinyl using my Silhouette Cameo, and then applied to the cups using lint roller sheets as transfer paper. Working with the small width of the lint roller was a lot easier than working with my 12″ wide roll of transfer paper! The lint roller sheets were super sticky, though, so it’s something to be aware of if you’re trying it out as transfer paper for the first time.

I did have a few parts of the design that bubbled up on me when I tried to get them perfectly smooth on the cup. I try and work out the air bubble to the nearest edge of the design, but when that doesn’t work, I use a pin to poke a teeny tiny hole in the bubbled up part. After the vinyl was applied, I filled the inside of the cups with pretty tissue paper and a few drink mix packets. I loved the way they turned out, but I had no idea how I’d package them up for the teachers!

I figured I’d do a gift tag that I could cut with my Silhouette and attach it to the cup with twine. I saw one of my friends used an incredibly cute Silhouette sketch design for her teacher gift tags – a set of three apples. I figured that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, so I did the same! I used the new Advanced cut features in the Silhouette software to denote that anything colored in Green would be done using a sketch pen, and anything in red would be an actual cut line. The cut by line color really made my life easier!

After my gift tags were “sketched” and cut, I attached them to the cups using some pretty striped bakers twine (also a Target dollar spot score!). Because of my dollar spot finds and my healthy craft materials stash at home, this project ended up costing me a little bit over $4 for each teacher. I’m really happy with the way that these turned out and excited to bring them into school with Max in the morning!

Woo hoo! We’re going to Disney World!! Of course, I can’t wait and of course, I’m a bit obsessed right now. I’ve had a countdown going on my phone since we booked the trip and I’ve been meaning to create some sort of physical countdown craft for in the house for a while. But I haven’t been able to decide on what to do.

I liked this one:So cute! But I’m way not into painting wood.

…and this one:Perfect use for Pick Your Plum blank wooden block sets!! Too bad I didn’t buy a set. Will have to remember next time they come up for sale.

…and this one:Oh! Oh! Oh! How cute is that one?! But making it to an actual craft store where I could pick up wreath forms just isn’t happening these days.

I finally decided to just do something that I could use the materials I had on hand. So with a bit of red polka dot fabric (leftover from making the crib skirt for Max’s nursery), some black vinyl, some chalkboard vinyl, my Silhouette Cameo, and a picture frame, I put together our Disney countdown!

First, I removed the back of my picture frame and cut the fabric so that I could wrap it around the back. I just secured my fabric down with tape because the frame would hold it in place once I put it back together (and after the trip is over, this whole countdown will easily disassemble so that I can use the frame for other projects).

Then, I assembled the frame; it already looks pretty cute, right?

I cut and weeded my vinyl with my Silhouette. I cut the Mickey head from chalkboard vinyl and the words (using Waltograph font) from indoor (non-permanent) black vinyl.

Then I applied my vinyl to the picture frame’s glass. When I created the design, I didn’t account for the fact that an 8×10 picture frame wouldn’t have 8×10 inches of glass showing after it was put in the frame. So it took some rearranging and I ended up erring on the side of caution and spreading out the design a little bit more than was necessary toward the top and bottom, but I still think that it turned out pretty cute!

And it looks pretty cute on my mantle snuggled in between two of my favorite pictures of my little man!

About Ali

I'm a mom to a gorgeous little guy named Max. I work outside the home full time, but in my "spare" time I love learning and am always working on projects that let me broaden my knowledge of sewing, photography, and any number of things that pique my interest!